ember-cli-flash

Simple, highly configurable flash messages for ember.

This ember addon adds a flash message service and component to your app.

Table of Contents

• Installation
• Compatibility
• Usage
  • Convenience methods (Bootstrap / Foundation alerts)
    • Bootstrap
    • Foundation
  • Custom messages
    • Custom messages API
  • Animated example
  • Arbitrary options
    • Example use case
  • Clearing all messages on screen
  • Returning flash object
• Service defaults
• Displaying flash messages
  • Custom close action
  • Styling with Foundation or Bootstrap
  • Sort messages by priority
  • Rounded corners (Foundation)
  • Custom flash message component
• Acceptance / Integration tests
• Unit testing
• Styling
• License
• Contributors

Installation

ember install ember-cli-flash

Compatibility

This addon is tested against the release, beta and canary channels, ~1.11.0, and 1.12.1. Because this addon makes use of attribute bindings, which were introduced in ember 1.11.0, earlier versions of ember are not compatible with the latest version.

Usage

Usage is very simple. First, add one of the template examples to your app. Then, inject the flashMessages service and use one of its convenience methods:

import Component from '@ember/component';
import { inject } from '@ember/service';

export default Component.extend({
  flashMessages: inject()
});

Convenience methods (Bootstrap / Foundation alerts)

You can quickly add flash messages using these methods from the service:

Bootstrap

• .success
• .warning
• .info
• .danger

Foundation

• .success
• .warning
• .info
• .alert
• .secondary

These will add the appropriate classes to the flash message component for styling in Bootstrap or Foundation. For example:

// Bootstrap: the flash message component will have 'alert alert-success' classes
// Foundation: the flash message component will have 'alert-box success' classes
this.flashMessages.success('Success!');

You can take advantage of Promises, and their .then and .catch methods. To add a flash message after saving a model (or when it fails):

actions: {
  saveFoo() {
    const flashMessages = this.flashMessages;

    this.model
      .save()
      .then((res) => {
        flashMessages.success('Successfully saved!');
        doSomething(res);
      })
      .catch((err) => {
        flashMessages.danger('Something went wrong!');
        handleError(err);
      });
  }
}

Custom messages

If the convenience methods don't fit your needs, you can add custom messages with add:

this.flashMessages.add({
  message: 'Custom message'
});

Custom messages API

You can also pass in options to custom messages:

this.flashMessages.add({
  message: 'I like alpacas',
  type: 'alpaca',
  timeout: 500,
  priority: 200,
  sticky: true,
  showProgress: true,
  extendedTimeout: 500,
  destroyOnClick: false,
  onDestroy() {
    // behavior triggered when flash is destroyed
  }
});

this.flashMessages.success('This is amazing', {
  timeout: 100,
  priority: 100,
  sticky: false,
  showProgress: true
});

• message: string

  Required when preventDuplicates is enabled. The message that the flash message displays.

• type?: string

  Default: info

  This is mainly used for styling. The flash message's type is set as a class name on the rendered component, together with a prefix. The rendered class name depends on the message type that was passed into the component.

• timeout?: number

  Default: 3000

  Number of milliseconds before a flash message is automatically removed.

• priority?: number

  Default: 100

  Higher priority messages appear before low priority messages. The best practise is to use priority values in multiples of 100 (100 being the lowest priority). Note that you will need modify your template for this work.

• sticky?: boolean

  Default: false

  By default, flash messages disappear after a certain amount of time. To disable this and make flash messages permanent (they can still be dismissed by click), set sticky to true.

• showProgress?: boolean

  Default: false

  To show a progress bar in the flash message, set this to true.

• extendedTimeout?: number

  Default: 0

  Number of milliseconds before a flash message is removed to add the class 'exiting' to the element. This can be used to animate the removal of messages with a transition.

• destroyOnClick?: boolean

  Default: true

  By default, flash messages will be destroyed on click. Disabling this can be useful if the message supports user interaction.

• onDestroy: function

  Default: undefined

  A function to be called when the flash message is destroyed.

Animated example

To animate messages, set extendedTimeout to something higher than zero. Here we've chosen 500ms.

module.exports = function(environment) {
  var ENV = {
    flashMessageDefaults: {
      extendedTimeout: 500
    }
  }
}

Then animate using CSS transitions, using the .active and .active.exiting classes.

.alert {
  opacity: 0;
  position: relative;
  left: 100px;

  transition: all 700ms cubic-bezier(0.68, -0.55, 0.265, 1.55);

  &.active {
    opacity: 1;
    left: 0px;

    &.exiting {
      opacity: 0;
      left: 100px;
    }
  }
}

Arbitrary options

You can also add arbitrary options to messages:

this.flashMessages.success('Cool story bro', {
  someOption: 'hello'
});

this.flashMessages.add({
  message: 'hello',
  type: 'foo',
  componentName: 'some-component',
  content: customContent
});

Example use case

This makes use of the component helper, allowing the template that ultimately renders the flash to be dynamic:

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} as |component flash|>
    {{#if flash.componentName}}
      {{component flash.componentName content=flash.content}}
    {{else}}
      <h6>{{component.flashType}}</h6>
      <p>{{flash.message}}</p>
    {{/if}}
  </FlashMessage>
{{/each}}

Clearing all messages on screen

It's best practice to use flash messages sparingly, only when you need to notify the user of something. If you're sending too many messages, and need a way for your users to clear all messages from screen, you can use this method:

this.flashMessages.clearMessages();

Returning flash object

The flash message service is designed to be Fluent, allowing you to chain methods on the service easily. The service should handle most cases but if you want to access the flash object directly, you can use the getFlashObject method:

const flashObject = this.flashMessages.add({
  message: 'hola',
  type: 'foo'
}).getFlashObject();

You can then manipulate the flashObject directly. Note that getFlashObject must be the last method in your chain as it returns the flash object directly.

Service defaults

In config/environment.js, you can override service defaults in the flashMessageDefaults object:

module.exports = function(environment) {
  var ENV = {
    flashMessageDefaults: {
      // flash message defaults
      timeout: 5000,
      extendedTimeout: 0,
      priority: 200,
      sticky: true,
      showProgress: true,

      // service defaults
      type: 'alpaca',
      types: [ 'alpaca', 'notice', 'foobar' ],
      preventDuplicates: false
    }
  }
}

See the options section for information about flash message specific options.

• type?: string

  Default: info

  When adding a custom message with add, if no type is specified, this default is used.

• types?: array

  Default: [ 'success', 'info', 'warning', 'danger', 'alert', 'secondary' ]

  This option lets you specify exactly what types you need, which means in the above example, you can do this.flashMessages.{alpaca,notice,foobar}.

• preventDuplicates?: boolean

  Default: false

  If true, only 1 instance of a flash message (based on its message) can be added at a time. For example, adding two flash messages with the message "Great success!" would only add the first instance into the queue, and the second is ignored.

Displaying flash messages

Then, to display somewhere in your app, add this to your template:

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} />
{{/each}}

It also accepts your own template:

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} as |component flash|>
    <h6>{{component.flashType}}</h6>
    <p>{{flash.message}}</p>
    {{#if component.showProgressBar}}
      <div class="alert-progress">
        <div class="alert-progressBar" style="{{component.progressDuration}}"></div>
      </div>
    {{/if}}
  </FlashMessage>
{{/each}}

Custom close action

The close action is always passed to the component whether it is used or not. It can be used to implement your own close button, such as an x in the top-right corner.

When using a custom close action, you will want to set destroyOnClick=false to override the default (destroyOnClick=true). You could do this globally in flashMessageDefaults.

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} as |component flash close|>
    {{flash.message}}
    <span role="button" {{on "click" (action close)}}>x</span>
  </FlashMessage>
{{/each}}

Styling with Foundation or Bootstrap

By default, flash messages will have Bootstrap style class names. If you want to use Foundation, simply specify the messageStyle on the component:

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} @messageStyle='foundation' />
{{/each}}

Styling with user-specified message type class prefix

If you don't wish to use the class names associated with Bootstrap / Foundation, specify the messageStylePrefix on the component. This will override the class name prefixes with your own. For example, messageStylePrefix='special-alert-' would create flash messages with the class special-alert-succcess

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} @messageStylePrefix='special-alert-' />
{{/each}}

Sort messages by priority

To display messages sorted by priority, add this to your template:

{{#each flashMessages.arrangedQueue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} />
{{/each}}

Rounded corners (Foundation)

To add radius or round type corners in Foundation:

{{#each flashMessages.arrangedQueue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} @messageStyle='foundation' class='radius' />
{{/each}}

{{#each flashMessages.arrangedQueue as |flash|}}
  <FlashMessage @flash={{flash}} @messageStyle='foundation' class='round' />
{{/each}}

Custom flash message component

If the provided component isn't to your liking, you can easily create your own. All you need to do is pass in the flash object to that component:

{{#each flashMessages.queue as |flash|}}
  <CustomComponent @flash={{flash}} />
{{/each}}

Acceptance / Integration tests

When you install the addon, it should automatically generate a helper located at tests/helpers/flash-message.js. You can do this manually as well:

$ ember generate ember-cli-flash

This also adds the helper to tests/test-helper.js. You won't actually need to import this into your tests, but it's good to know what the blueprint does. Basically, the helper overrides a method used to initialise the flash-message's class, so that it behaves intuitively in a testing environment.

Some example tests below, based on qunit.

An example acceptance test:

// tests/acceptance/foo-page-test.js

import { module, test } from 'qunit'
import { setupApplicationTest } from 'ember-qunit'
import { click, visit } from '@ember/test-helpers'

module('Application | Component | foo-page', function (hooks) {
  setupApplicationTest(hooks)

  test('flash message is rendered', async function(assert) {
    assert.expect(1);

    await visit('/');

    await click('.button-that-opens-alert')

    assert.dom('.alert.alert-success').exists({ count: 1 });
  });
});

An example integration test:

// tests/integration/components/x-foo-test.js

import { module, test } from 'qunit'
import { setupRenderingTest } from 'ember-qunit'
import { render } from '@ember/test-helpers'
import { hbs } from 'ember-cli-htmlbars'

module('Integration | Component | x-foo', function (hooks) {
  setupRenderingTest(hooks)

  hooks.beforeEach(function() {
    // We have to register any types we expect to use in this component
    const typesUsed = ['info', 'warning', 'success'];
    this.owner.lookup('service:flash-messages').registerTypes(typesUsed);
  })

  test('it renders', function(assert) {
    await render(hbs`<XFoo/>`)
    ...
  })
});

Unit testing

For unit tests that require the flashMessages service, you'll need to do a small bit of setup:

import { module, test } from 'qunit'
import { setupTest } from 'ember-qunit'

module('Container | Route | foo', function (hooks) {
  setupTest(hooks)

  hooks.beforeEach(function() {
    // We have to register any types we expect to use in this component
    const typesUsed = ['info', 'warning', 'success'];
    this.owner.lookup('service:flash-messages').registerTypes(typesUsed);
  })

  test('it does the thing it should do', function(assert) {
    const subject = this.owner.lookup('route:foo')
    ...
  })
});

Styling

This addon is minimal and does not currently ship with a stylesheet. You can style flash messages by targeting the appropriate alert classes in your CSS.

License

MIT

Contributors

We're grateful to these wonderful contributors who've contributed to ember-cli-flash: